


The One Where They're Vampires

by SinisterScribe



Series: Love at First Bite [1]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M, Graham is just happy to be here, Graham is just trying to get everybody to get along, Graham is so done with just about everybody, Less Whedon More Stoker, Regina is so done with being undead, Vampire AU!, a different take on 2B, bacon and eggs fixes everything, can Graham be OOC if he never had C to begin with?, graphic depiction of vampire feeding, graverobbing, kind of a oneshot, season 2 everybody is an ass, they're cute when they're nesting, thresholds are a thing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-23
Updated: 2017-06-23
Packaged: 2018-11-18 03:28:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11282853
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SinisterScribe/pseuds/SinisterScribe
Summary: Pretty much exactly what it says on the tags. I wanted to write a bit of a HQ drabble but I don't really do little drabbles so y'all have a gigantic oneshot that may be part of a further series later on.I've been kicking around the idea of Regina bringing Graham back for a while and this was the only plot that didn't involve a multi-chapter monstrosity.Ratings are for descriptions of vampire feeding habits and also sexy times (pro tip: they usually happen at the same time).





	The One Where They're Vampires

**Author's Note:**

> This gave me cravings to watch Buffy. 
> 
> Which would be fine but I really didn't like Buffy the character. So I read a lot of sick and twisted Joyce/Giles/Ethan fic instead. 
> 
> I may write more of this. I mean, I've left enough unanswered questions to do so. I guess it depends on how much people want me to and how I'm feeling about it.
> 
> This is not replacing any other fic. I'm still chipping away at them so fear not. I just wanted to try and see what it would be like to write Graham as something other than solely growly alpha. 
> 
> I mean, he still is, but he smiles more so that's something. 
> 
> Apologies if there are any mistakes, I have no beta.

**Blood Born**

**_The Graveyard…_ **

 

Regina blurred from one shadow to the next in the darkness of gathering dusk. The hammering rain fell in sheets all about her and further camouflaged her against being seen by the local residents. Just as well considering she was about to commit a crime and they were rather under the impression that she already had.

Again.

Well, for once she was innocent.

Not that it mattered because she had more pressing matters to deal with. Her mother was going to have to wait.

The sidewalk popped out of focus and Regina felt herself tilt, she snapped a hand out so quickly to catch herself that her claws caught on the polished stone of the graveyard wall. She hissed in annoyance when she saw she had left evidence of her presence and hadn’t the magic to cover her tracks.

Regina panted, willing the dizziness to pass and tried to focus herself.

The rain was needling cold. The night was drawing in, the sun setting, by all rights she should feel stronger. As the sun receded, her powers should flourish.

Of course, she had found that being a vampire came with significant downsides.

The dizzy spell passed, she pushed herself off the wall and continued on towards the secluded spot that she had picked to get into the graveyard. She hefted her pack higher over her back and came to the tree that arched over the top of the wall to hang over the cemetery on the other side. The wall was ten feet tall, even when she had been augmented by her magic, she wouldn’t have chosen to go over it.

Still, she was out of other options.

Regina flexed her fingers and toes, claws extending from their sheaths there. She ignored the ache that set off in her teeth, the need to feed pounding in her head, in her belly, in her _lungs_.

She lunged up the tree, swarming up it like a curl of smoke in the greying night, her steely nails digging into the wet bark with excellent purchase.

She would readily admit that she was much more agile like this. As nimble as a cat. She effortlessly scaled the tree and crawled across one of the broader branches to drop neatly into the cemetery.

She hadn’t disturbed even a single leaf with her passage.

Regina cast about, looking for what she had come for and started across the graveyard with long strides. She had learned to handle her new and preternatural speed but she was too weak to use it currently. She settled for blending from one shadow to the next until she came to her mark. She battered back another wave of dizziness, like the worst blood sugar crash ever, and crouched by the headstone.

Her night vision was different now that she really was a nocturnal monster. Seeing into shadows sounded great in theory but it sometimes made reading relief carvings difficult to make out. She ran her fingertips over the lettering and confirmed her find.

It was him.

Regina set her pack down with a slosh from the contents. Her fingers did not slip on the buckles of the pack as she removed the collapsed shovel and set to work.

It really was a perfect night for grave robbing after all.

The turf was easily cut away. The ground had only been lying for a few months, after all. He wasn’t long dead. Not really.

As weakened as she was, it was still quickly done. She peeled back the turf and set it carefully aside in neat piles, turf to turf and soil to soil. She would leave evidence behind but she could do her best to minimise it.

Regina pulled out the tarp next, weighing it down with urns from nearby graves. Then she set to digging.

Even weak, even starving, it was _glorious_ to unleash her strength. She felt her lips pull back in a savage grin, fangs bared and her eyes burning, as she hurled dirt from the grave. She emptied it in a matter of minutes. Clods of slick earth piling higher and higher on the tarp until her shovel _clunked_ against something solid.

A coffin.

Regina discarded the shovel and set to clearing the rest of the earth away by hand. The slick mahogany of the coffin was further cleaned by the driving rain and she was free to examine it for interference.

Not that anyone would have a reason to but she wouldn’t put it past Whale. The lab rat was always looking for raw materials for his little experiments.

Regina’s fangs bared like ivory knives when she thought of his last ‘experiment’ and the raw materials involved. Her chest still ached from Daniel’s loss but it was a pain she was accustomed to.

It was nothing compared to the hunger.

Regina reached down, her claws hooking under the lid of the casket and punching through the wood as if it were paper. With a grunt and a heave, she swung the top half of the casket open and stared down at the contents.

 _Graham_.

Her Huntsman lay in peaceful repose. He was dressed in his finest suit, as she had left him. She had been the one to dress him for his funeral after all. No autopsies for him. No modern embalming. She had washed him and clothed him and tucked that black tulip into his breast pocket beside the silver star that he had been buried with. She had slipped his favourite knife into his inner pocket and holstered an old fashioned pearl handled revolver at his side.

He was _perfectly_ preserved.

She had cursed herself for the weakness after she had done it. Her magic had been in short supply towards the end of the Curse. After she had used most of what precious little she’d had to preserve Graham, she had later been forced to sacrifice Daniel’s ring in order to summon the apple to poison Emma.

Regina rolled her eyes at herself.

And look how well that had turned out.

Regina shook it off. She had bigger things to deal with. Survive first, self recrimination later.

Rain pattered down onto Graham, fizzling as it came into contact with the field of magic surrounding him. Even after the curse breaking and her weakened without magic, swallowing a death curse and then turning into a glorified leech, it had held.

Regina smirked. She really was the most powerful sorceress the world had ever seen.

Her smile dimmed.

Well, she had been.

Her magic was a shadow of itself now. The elements no longer answered her command. She couldn’t teleport, change her shape (well, much), or even reinforce her feet against the torture of her stiletto heels…but there had been other payoffs.

Like super strength, as Henry would call it.

Regina leaned down, balanced nimbly on her toes, and hooked her arms under Graham’s. He was heavy, she recognised that he must be as he was literally deadweight, but she didn’t even grunt with effort as she worked him out of his coffin.

She dragged him up and over her shoulder (he was so much bigger than her that his fingers and shoes nearly dragged on the ground anyway) and scrambled up out of the grave. She set him down on the ground, laying him out, and fetched an umbrella from her pack.

Snapping it open, she punched the handle into the ground and set to unpacking the rest of her supplies, satisfied with the meagre shelter the umbrella could offer. This wouldn’t take long, even if it didn’t work, and she wasn’t about to refill the grave and then find that she had to dig it out again if her theory happened to be wrong.

No. Don’t think like that. Regina shook her head to ward off another savage hunger pang. This had to work. She had no other options short of murder and…and she would _not_ become that. Not again.

Regina laid out everything she needed and unbuttoned Graham’s clothes so that his torso was bared to her. She patted at him carefully. She still wasn’t used to being so prodigiously strong and it was a good thing she could youtube how to reattach doors because she’d been doing a lot of that recently. So she carefully palpated his abdomen until she was relatively sure of where each organ was. She thought the stomach was…there.

Probably.

Hopefully.

Next the blood bags.

Drawing her own blood and chilling it had probably not been the wisest thing to do since she was now suffering from a chronic case of anaemia but she’d had few options. She had twelve pints. Enough to replace the blood still left in Graham’s body and then some.

Twelve pints and a REALLY big syringe.

Her hands shook a little as she pierced the first bag with the needle of the syringe and slowly drew back the plunger, draining the bag dry. She palpated for his stomach again with her free hand. She’d rather not get this wrong.

It was always higher than people thought it was. Right up under the ribs, nestled under the diaphragm.

Still, accessible if you had a needle big enough. Which Regina did.

She plunged the needle into his cool flesh, it would have been a difficult job to get past all the muscle and sinew had she not been as strong as her new found vampirism allowed her to be. She emptied the syringe of her blood into his stomach. Carefully withdrawing the syringe and heartened to see that the piercing of the needle had broken the preserving charm on him but he wasn’t necrotising before her very eyes which had been her worst case scenario.

Then she drained another bag into the syringe and started all over again. This time in his neck.

It was a strange kind of work. She was hardly one to be squeamish, he certainly wasn’t the first dead body she had experimented on, though he was the first experiment she’d had so much riding on. If this didn’t work, she had no idea what to do. Her task was methodical and she had memorised and theorised enough that she did it without agonising over every step.

It was a simple thing, an odd pleasure, to be finally _doing something_ that might improve her new quality of life. She’d spent so long poring over books, rearranging her house, tearing her surroundings apart with uncontrollable strength, it was a relief to do something with skill and dexterity.

When she had run out of blood and places to inject it into Regina set to removing her own shirt. This was the last part. Live vampire blood to activate the dormant blood she had just injected all over his body.

In theory, it should work the same way the bite had on her. Though hopefully without the thirty year time delay.

She had been bitten amongst her escapades as the Evil Queen back in the Enchanted Forest. Her indigenous magic had warded off the effects from taking hold and killing her as would have happened had she been strictly mortal back then. So she had remained a sorceress of some pant wettingly terrifying power.

When she had cast her Curse and come to Storybrooke, her magic had disappeared –or at least become dormant- but so had the magic that the vampirism would have needed to overtake her. So it had remained asleep within her blood.

It must have awakened again when the Curse broke. It must have been what cut her off temporarily from her own power. It was why she had struggled until she had managed to kickstart her magic with her mother’s book and forced the virus into slumber again.

That was how it worked after all. Vampirism was a virus. It either; killed the host straight away and reanimated them as a creature of the night with a penchant for O negative or it lay dormant in the marrow of their bones until they died in whichever way they were fated to die and _then_ it reanimated, reconstituted and overtook its host.

Then, three weeks ago, when she had swallowed the death curse over the well, when she had brought Emma and Snow back from the Enchanted Forest. She’d had so much toxicity in her that it had very nearly killed her. Her magic all but snuffed but the magic in the air, the death in the curse, perhaps even Gold’s nearby malevolent presence had pushed the latent vampire curse within her to activate.

She had been reborn a vampire, leaning against a tree, in the middle of the day whilst her son called another his mother.

Regina shook of such thoughts and returned her attention to the task at hand.

She pulled her shirt away, tossing it to the ground and knelt over Graham in her bra and slacks. Not the first time she had been in a state of undress around him but the lack of pulse on his end was a concern.

Picking Graham up, lifting his torso, she curled her arm around his shoulders and tangled her fingers in his curling hair so as to better direct his head. He was so much larger than her that this was going to be awkward.

Still, awkwardness was hardly likely to stop her.

Regina angled him as best she could, making sure that his mouth was open. Rigor had long since passed and the preservation spell ensured there was no stench from him. As it was, his coolness was the only disturbing thing about the entire situation, he looked asleep after all.

With her free hand, Regina dragged her sharp thumbnail down over the meat of her shoulder parallel to her bra strap. Her skin split at the whisper of the wound and dark blood welled slowly, sluggishly. Her heart did not beat as often as it had when she was human, her blood pressure lower unless she felt threatened.

She leaned over, angling herself as best she could and pressed Graham’s mouth to the wound. He could not drink from her –this was the flaw in her plan that she was hoping to circumvent- but she hoped that gravity and the blood infusions would do the trick.

She sat there patiently, bleeding into his mouth, and waited.

It happened _alarmingly_ fast.

One second it had been the pattering of the rain against the umbrella and then a coughing groan huffed from deep in his chest.

Regina had time to stiffen in an emotion she hesitated to name and then he lunged.

She actually yelped when he toppled her to the ground, his strength was _phenomenal._ He pinned her beneath him, his body caging hers and his mouth bit down on her shoulder.

Regina gasped when he drank deeply from her and she was heartened that she hadn’t wounded her neck. The shoulder bled freely but was easily staunched, it could be a debilitating area to take a wound to but rarely a fatal one.

Well, considering she was somewhere between alive and dead as it was, who knew what was fatal and what wasn’t?

Graham growled again, draining her voraciously, but she had been prepared for this. She had raided the hospital for more than empty blood bags and oversized syringes. She had transfused several bags of blood into her own body before coming out here.

Contrary to popular belief, human blood could not sustain a vampire. They might survive on it for a short time, as a last resort, and it reduced the more necrotic aspects of the affliction, but only another vampire’s blood might hope to keep a vampire healthy and sane.

Which was the reason for this whole escapade.

So she let him feed.

Left with nothing better to do, Regina analysed the sensations of his feeding.

It didn’t… _hurt_ precisely. There was a fierce burn at the site where his mouth covered her wound but it was akin to the singe of scratching an itch to the point of pain. Painful, yes, but oddly satisfying at the same time. She felt lightheaded, the desire to let him do as he would and continue feeding from her was certainly there but she couldn’t tell if that was something of the vampire in her or because she knew that the sooner he adapted, the sooner she could eat him.

“Enough.” Her voice was hoarse and her fangs fully extended but she had forced herself to practice to the point where she could speak without lisping with them.

Graham went still, hesitating.

“Seal the wound.” She ordered him. He should be open to her suggestion. Everything she had read told her that he should do as he was told for at least the first 24 hours after being turned.

His tongue traced over the cut on her shoulder and she growled.

She surprised herself with the bass sound of it and was further shocked when he growled back.

He should NOT be growling.

Still, he finally obeyed and kissed at her wound.

It was bizarre and she had read the passage in the tome of _Bite Breederf and Blood Magyckf_ several times but had found it to be true. Something coated her lips now, a natural sheen, and it caused a sort of accelerated healing without turning overactive scar tissue malignant.

Vampires were pretty good at covering their tracks in their own ways she supposed.

Graham sat up abruptly and Regina went still. She hadn’t told him to do that and she was seriously beginning to think that things were not going according to plan.

Graham tilted his head back and scented the air with audible inhales through his nose. He wrinkled his nose in apparent distaste, his eyes were still closed, but his face was harder now that he was conscious and apparently not very happy. He reached up and touched gently at his eyes.

“I’m blind.”

Regina’s eyebrows shot up. If he wasn’t supposed to be growling then he _certainly_ wasn’t supposed to be talking. He should be gentle and malleable. Moreso than he even had been under the Curse.

He shouldn’t be freaking her out by _talking_.

“Regina?” He cocked his head, eyes still closed and straddling her hips casually. “Did you glue my eyes shut for betraying you?”

Regina winced at the reminder of him and the Swan twit and rolled her eyes.

“Just answer me, none of the eye rolling.”

“I thought you couldn’t see.” She snapped.

“I can’t but you’re still you.”

She coughed a laugh at that.

“After a fashion.” She murmured and decided to roll with it. All things considered, it could be going a lot worse. Had their situations been reversed, she’d certainly have tried to drain him into a dried out husk and to hell with the consequences.

“Well?” He folded his arms over his chest and tilted his head the other way.

“I didn’t do anything to your eyes.” Regina was needled into responding. Probably not her smartest choice but she was redefining hangry. “The funeral parlour must have glued them shut. Bit difficult to have a peaceful funeral with the corpse staring at the guests.”

Graham stilled at that. Absorbing the information.

 He didn’t seem to care about the rain falling on them both and he was taking the whole Back From the Dead thing _very_ well.

“You killed me.”

“I made a promise.” Regina was increasingly aware that he was very heavy and she didn’t know if she was strong enough to shift him. He was freshly fed, after all.

“That’s true.” He murmured and then toppled forward suddenly.

His palms _thudded_ into the ground on either side of her head and she jerked back until her hair mingled with the wet grass despite herself. His head darted for her throat faster than she could track in her starved state –gods, she was almost human like this, it was _awful_ \- and his face burrowed into the crook of her neck.

She lifted a hand, bones crackling and claws singing through the air but he effortlessly caught her wrist.

He was smelling her.

“Vampire.” He murmured and inhaled again. “Hungry one.”

Regina let out a low hiss.

“Hungry and angry. You’ve always been delightful like that.”

She could hear the smirk in his tone.

“Explain.”

“Not here. We have to go. Get off.”

“No heart. I don’t have to do as you say anymore.”

Regina let loose another hiss and this time with a thunderous undertone of that deep growl again. She flexed a little beneath him, testing her strength, and ground her teeth when she realised she probably couldn’t move him without his help. She was too _weak_.

She huffed a petulant sounding sigh.

“Please?”

He took his time considering.

“Very well.” He rose up, releasing her wrist and getting to his feet.

He wobbled a little, either his limbs were still not fully incorporated into his newly vampiric state or the lack of sight threw him off. Still, he drunkenly straightened himself and stood with his back to her. He tilted his head back and let the rain fall heavily onto his face.

Regina curled up into a sitting position and snatched up her shirt. She scowled and pulled the sodden cold fabric over her shoulders.

Well, this was just peachy.

Her newborn vampire had absolutely no intention of doing as she told him for the first time in nearly forty years. Great. Outstanding. Fab.

She was _undead_ and still life was fucking her over at every opportunity.

“Did you cry at my funeral?”

Regina looked up at Graham with a frown. He had turned to face her even if he couldn’t look at her.

“Of course not.” She shoved herself to her feet and stilled when he grinned a white slash of teeth in the dark.

“ _Liar_.”

Regina growled.

Disobedient and a lie detector.

She’d resurrected another Emma Swan.

_Great!_

 

**_Later, Back at the Manor…_ **

 

“Sit.” Regina shoved Graham towards a kitchen stool and resisted the urge to growl when he accidentally kicked it and sent it careening across the room to smack into the wall and leave a dent.

That would be the super strength kicking in.

Excellent.

“You moved things.” His voice held a note of accusation as he felt around for another stool and managed to sit on that one. “This used to be further left.”

“I’d read that some vampires had specific skills, I didn’t realise yours was feng shui.”

Graham snorted, probably with no idea as to what feng shui was, and settled himself to sit comfortably. He inhaled deeply and then frowned.

“Air tastes different.”

“The Curse broke. That’s probably it.” Regina dumped her soggy pack and rummaged for towels amongst the clean laundry in the laundry room. She didn’t raise her voice, his hearing was more than keen enough to pick up what she said.

“No…where is Henry?”

Regina stilled at that, her hands tightening on a towel for a moment. She shook it off and stepped back out into the kitchen.

“He doesn’t live here anymore.”

“I’m glad he’s not dead.”

Regina blinked at that.

“You knew it was a risk. I imagine that’s why you were so determined to keep the curse from breaking.” Graham shrugged as if it were obvious.

She had forgotten. She had forgotten how long they had been together and how well he knew her as a result. Emma had told Regina that his last words had been that he remembered, he remembered everything, she had not realised that he remembered everything of the _curse_ as well. That he would apply that and extrapolate.

Yes, she had been terrified that the curse breaking would separate her from Henry. By the time Emma had come to Storybrooke it had been the only thing that Regina _had_ feared.

“It was a close one.” Her voice was hollow and her fangs tried to extend in a typical threat display. A useless one considering he couldn’t see it and she needed him alive as much as he did her.

“He’s okay?”

“Yes.” Aside from thinking she had murdered Archie, sure, he was fine.

Graham cocked his head as if he had heard the things she had left unsaid too but he did not comment further. He sat patiently and waited for her next move.

“Aren’t you mad?” The question blurted from her before she could stop it.

“Nope.” Graham smiled and shook his head.

“Why?” Regina crossed the kitchen to him and clapped another towel onto his lap. “I killed you and brought you back to pretty much be my lunch for eternity and you’re taking it pretty well. Freakishly well, actually.”

Graham smirked and tilted his head to the side. He pursed his lips as if considering if he should tell her.

“What?” She growled.

“You _lost_.”

Regina stiffened as if he had struck her and very nearly attempted to slap the grin from his face when he sensed her indignation. He continued gleefully.

“You lost. Horribly. Near fatally if you’re now a vampire, Henry’s okay so you didn’t cost him his health or your sanity _and_ I’m alive again.”

“Undead.” Regina growled.

“Six and two threes.” Graham shrugged. “All of that and you _need_ me. It’s kind of beautiful.”

“Yeah, well, you’re not going to be saying that in a couple of days.” Regina lifted her towel and started rubbing vigorously at her hair. “You’re going to start to get _hungry_.”

“I’ve had worse.” Graham shrugged again, still smirking.

Regina tossed his towel over his head so she didn’t have to look at the expression anymore. This plan had been a lot better when she had thought he was going to be a mindless drone for a day or two.

As it was, she was tired, she was hungry, she was _filthy_ and she now had to figure out what to do with a very alive and very _puckish_ Graham. She wished idly for a moment that she really had murdered Archie so that she might have brought him back. HE would have had the decency to obey her every whim.

Regina stilled when Graham started to peel himself out of his wet clothes. He apparently had no interest in staying in his soggy funeral suit. His towel was still somewhat comically draped over his head but he stripped out of his clothes in record time. Regina only spoke when it became clear he wasn’t going to stop at his _shirt_.

“What are you doing?”

“Getting dry.” His voice was a _study_ in innocence. He wriggled actively out of his trousers and shorts.

Well, at least she now had proof that her imagination hadn’t been embellishing his attributes after his death.  

“Naked? Here?”

“It’s nothing you haven’t seen before.” He shrugged a broad shoulder and Regina nearly choked on her own fangs they unsheathed so quickly. “Surely it doesn’t bother ye?”

“No.” Regina managed to talk around her oversized teeth and resisted the urge to try and _push_ them back in. She had tried in the past, it didn’t work.

“ _Liar_.” Graham tugged the towel off his head so that she could see him lick the word at her.

Regina hissed at him.

“So grumpy when she’s hungry.” Graham pouted at her and Regina resisted the urge to double check that myth about stakes and vampires with the remains of the stool.

She had gone to a lot of effort to prepare her meal, she wasn’t about to spoil it now.

“So,” Graham rocked back to sit down on the stool again, rubbing at his arms and chest with the towel, “the question then becomes: why haven’t you sated that hunger before now?”

Regina huffed a sigh, ignoring the slight whistle of air between her teeth, and set to stripping off her own clothes too. He was right, it was nothing they hadn’t seen before and he couldn’t see at all right now anyway.

“Humans are no good.”

“A book told you?”

“My stomach did.” She bit at him. That had been an unfortunate experiment.

The mesmerising had nearly ended up lobotomising her chosen victim, she had nearly torn his throat completely out with her uncontrolled strength, the taste had been lacking to put it politely and all it had seemed to do was make her hungrier. Like a starter with no main course.

“So you need another vampire.”

“Hence your presence.” She growled at him. Like she’d have brought him back for any other reason. She _hadn’t_ cried at his funeral.

“So I’m blind and relatively helpless…and you’re still not pouncing.” It wasn’t a question but she answered anyway.

“You’re still becoming a vampire. I’m not sure feeding from you now would be a) good for you or b) good for me.” Regina peeled herself out of her wet slacks and used them to scrub the worst of the mud off. Digging out and refilling a grave wasn’t a neat task. “And you’re far from helpless.”

Graham grinned at that. Insufferably pleased.

“So, what does being a vampire entail?”

Regina ran her tongue over her teeth to gauge the length of her fangs before she spoke. She wondered if she should tell him the whole truth. Well, he’d find out soon enough if she lied. With a mental shrug, she went all in.

“Not much like this world’s mythology. We _can_ go out in sunlight but only once the sun is no longer on the rise. I sleep from dawn to noon. If I can be awake at that time, I’ve never managed it voluntarily. Our baseline _everything_ is better. Heightened senses, kinesis, mental acuity. We cannot feed from humans. Well, we can but it doesn’t do us much good. It would be like trying to survive off of bread and water.” Regina rubbed the towel down her naked legs and recited what she had learned through trial and error. “Speaking of food, we can consume proteins, fats and water. Any sort of carbohydrate tends to interfere with our biology. Violently.”

Graham winced at the inference but listened intently.

“The Hunger is the worst thing. We do still need to breathe, even if it is at a much slower rate, but we lose oxygen carrying red blood cells at an alarming rate. Human blood can act as a stop gap but it cannot withstand our more virulent immune systems for long. That and vampires reproduce by biting so the two needs of feeding and reproducing are… _linked_.”

“So when you say ‘hungry’ you mean ‘drowning and horny like you read about’?” Graham frowned and reached up to rub at his jaw. It was still clean of stubble from where she had shaved him in the funeral parlour.

Regina straightened and rolled her eyes. It was alarmingly accurate but she wasn’t about to dignify that with a response.

“Weaknesses?” Graham switched topics. “Stake to the heart?”

“Might not work in your case.” Regina drawled and then resigned herself to answering his question. “Sunlight has a soporific effect, vampires heal at a prodigious rate though so the stake to the heart may not work. Silver causes skin irritations similar to an allergic reaction and we can’t break it. I can rip steel to shreds but not silver. I don’t know why. Fire is very dangerous to us.”

“Fire kills most things.” Graham shrugged a shoulder.

“Hmm, but vampires are like tinder. Stay away from open flames.”

“Noted.” Graham flopped his towel onto his lap and thought for a moment. “You got something to get the glue out of my eyes?”

Regina blinked. She was still waiting for the other shoe to drop. For him to flip out. She had brought him back from the dead and –whilst she could no longer control him- she had fairly effectively bound their lives together for the foreseeable. He was taking it _remarkably_ well.

In all honesty, it was beginning to freak her out.

“I can mix something up.”

“Good. I’ll shower whilst you do that.” Graham stood from the stool, his head tilted back to compensate for his lack of sight.

That was another freakish thing. He had taken to his heightened senses like a duck to water. He had managed from the graveyard back to the manor incredibly well. Occasionally reaching out to touch her shoulder and ground himself but that had been it. Perhaps there was the added advantage of remembering walking the same streets of a very samey town for twenty eight years, and he knew her house thoroughly…but it was still creepy.

…said the vampire to herself. Regina rolled her eyes at such thoughts and ducked just in time when Graham wadded up his damp towel and lobbed it over her head and back into the laundry room.

She hissed out a breath when he grinned at making her dodge.

“There are clothes for you in the guest room.”

Graham cocked his head.

Of course, he’d never been in the guest room when he had stayed.

“Second door on your left after the master bedroom.”

“Got it.” He smirked and spun away, reaching out a hand to test where the wall was and calculate his position from there.

He didn’t stumble once on his way towards the stairs.

Regina tidied up the clothes they had left strewn about and bundled them all into the hamper by the machine. She was careful to pick up the silver sheriff’s badge with a pair of tongs from the cutlery drawer. She promptly stuffed it in an empty biscuit tin. She found a drawer to put his gun in and otherwise distracted herself until she heard the shower hum to life upstairs.

With a smirk, Regina _flitted_.

Not as ostentatious as teleportation but she would bet that it was a great deal more unnerving. To the human eye, it would look like she had disappeared from the kitchen and reappeared up in her bedroom.

She made short work of her own shower and rummaged for something comfortable to wear. Super strength and heightened senses were all well and good but they also meant that her skin was more reactive to certain textures. She was probably never going to wear jeans again (not that she had done so often in the past) and would likely eat anyone that suggested a corset in the future.

She settled on a pair of black leggings and the softest angora sweater she owned. She bypassed the hairdryer, she was oversensitive to the arid air it blew out now and froze when she caught sight of herself in the mirror (yes, she still had a reflection).

She was smiling.

The fuck was up with that?

 

**_In the Guest Shower…_ **

 

Graham sat in a crumpled heap in the shower stall.

His legs drawn up to his chest, his arms wrapped around them, and he convulsively shivered so hard that his teeth chattered. Teeth that were getting longer by the minute.

She had brought him back.

She had brought him _back_.

Graham panted, his heart and lungs seeming too loud and too big in his chest. He tried to remember what it was like being dead and found the memories slipping away as if they had never been.

There had certainly been _something_. Though he could no longer conjure an image or words to name it. It had been light, he was sure. Nothing had hurt.

That must be the case because _everything_ hurt now. His skin was raw. Like a nail that had been torn to the quick and that new skin that never felt the air of the world was suddenly exposed. Like that. All over.

It had taken everything he had to keep it together in front of her. To smirk and joke, to needle her. To test her. He had to know. He had to know how much power she had over him.

The answer; seemed like not a lot.

She hadn’t once used her magic against him. Even the push of her mind when she had tried to command him in the graveyard had been easily dodged. He’d seemed to just shrug it off. He had _felt_ the command but had been able –for the first time in decades- to ignore it. To simply turn his attention from it and not bother with listening.

He could have killed her then and there.

He was more than able. He had always been physically stronger between the two of them. That was why she had needed his heart and now she no longer had that. Handily, because she had crushed it, but whatever.

And that was another question; why could he hear a heart in his chest?

Graham let the lukewarm water needle down onto him and the pain of it was enough to keep him grounded in the moment and not completely go off the deep end.

He focussed on his breathing, turned his attention to it entirely, and forced himself to calm. It took long moments but he managed it.

This was just a twist on a situation he had lived before. At least now she was dependant on him as much as he was her. She could not control him but she did _need_ him. He needed her too, if she was telling the truth. He didn’t know yet if she had a reason to lie, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t. That aside, he did not need her _yet_.

He was the better fed of the two of them. Perhaps because he was still in the process of being turned into a vampire (which was bizarre but it barely made the top five) or because she had let him feed on her in the graveyard.

Which was a set of sensations he was filing away to ponder later.

It took him a while, but he managed to get his head back in order.

 As it stood, he had the higher ground here. He was certainly stronger than her and she seemed perfectly willing to unglue his eyes. Once he could see again, he could likely easily overpower her and leave the manor if he wanted to.

Come to think of it, he had no idea why she had brought him here of all places, but he had no intention of staying.

If she needed to feed from him and he her, then fine, he’d eaten worse. That was no reason to cohabitate.

With a short nod to himself, Graham finally unfolded himself a little in the shower. His limbs were heavy from having been so compressed for so long. His shivering had finally stopped though and his skin seemed to be adapting to the water temperature and pressure by the second.

It was getting easier. All of it was getting easier.

Graham stood and patted around for the soap. He found a bar, he couldn’t read the bottle labels anyway, and set to scrubbing himself clean of the scent of the graves and magic.

And tears.

He had been certain of that. Contrary to what she might believe, he hadn’t said it to needle her. He had smelled the saline of tears soaked into his clothes. It had been faint, it must have happened days ago (which made no sense, how long had passed between him dying and her bringing him back?) but he had certainly scented tears. Someone had cried for him. Weeping seemed apt as a funeral and if it had occurred whilst the Curse was still in effect then Regina would have had to have appeared since they had both been such public figures.

He couldn’t think of who else might have cried over him. Literally, all over him. He didn’t think Emma. The thing that had passed between them in his final moments had not been anything permanent. He had been elated to know his whole self, to know what was wrong with him, that it wasn’t in his head and…and to know that she could break the curse.

Hmm, that was a thought, had Emma just snogged everyone in the town to break the Curse one by one?

Graham snorted at the image. Never happen.

He had so many questions.

Questions which were not going to be answered in a shower stall.

Graham gave himself another rinse for good measure and then fumbled the faucet off. He shook himself like a dog, splattering water all over the stall and then stepped out to pat around for his towel. He had left it somewhere…there!

Clothes were trickier.

He managed to find the closet without much trouble, he only walked into it once and managed not to rip the door clean off its hinges. That would be the strength she’d been banging on about.

He was surprised when his own scent rolled out of the closet at him.

His clothes.

She had taken _his_ clothes and brought them to her house. Kept them in a closet.

Graham frowned, not sure what to make of that, but he found a pair of shorts and wriggled into them without toppling over. He identified his favourite pair of worn jeans by the two ripped belt loops at one side and dragged them on next. He found something that felt like it was one of his white undershirts and decided that was more than good enough.

He slung the shirt over his shoulder, his chest was still damp and Regina’s potion was likely to be noxious. That and he knew that the view would distract her a little.

Padding out of the room, he made his way back down to the kitchen and found her to be clattering around the place. He heard a hollow scraping, a wooden spoon in a pot maybe and made his way back to the stool he hadn’t long left.

“Two steps left, three forward, there’s a stool at the sink.”

She hadn’t turned to speak to him. Hmm, keener senses indeed.

Still, Graham did as he was told. The sooner he got his sight back, the better.

“So,” he felt for the stool by the sink and sat down on it, setting his shirt aside, “how long have I been dead?”

She stilled for a half second, her breathing catching a little, and then forced herself to continue what she was doing.

“A few months.”

“A few?”

“Four.”

“Hmm.” Graham mulled that over. “What’d I miss?”

She laughed and Graham found himself smiling at the sound. It was a rueful laugh but it was honest. It felt like years since he’d heard her laugh with good humour but he’d take what he could get.

So she told him. She told him everything.

About trying to replace him as Sheriff with Sidney but being beaten out by Swan. How Emma’s various adventures had led her to breaking the curse. How Maleficent had been killed, how Gold had screwed her over, how Henry had nearly died. She explained about the Curse breaking but them all remaining in Storybrooke, magic coming back but not answering her call, Swan being some kind of magical battery but getting sucked through the portal to the Enchanted Forest, adventuring over there for a month or so and then Regina half killing herself to bring them back.

Graham frowned at that. He had said little during her speech other than a faint sympathy about Maleficent, he knew the women had been close, but he wanted to know more about how she had come to be this.

“Why would you do that?”

“Because Henry asked me to.” Regina said it simply, like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

He supposed, to her, it was.

“Lean back. This is warm but shouldn’t burn.” Regina guided him to tip back on the stool so that he leaned backwards over the sink. She carefully spooned whatever mixture she’d concocted over his eyes. “Do NOT open your eyes, even if you feel like you can, just let it work for a minute and then I’ll rinse it off.”

Graham grunted in affirmation and then settled back to wait. It wasn’t caustic or burning him. It felt warm but not corrosive. He felt it dribble down over his temples towards his hair but she mopped it away with a flannel before it could get that far.

“And how did swallowing the death curse lead to vampirism?”

“I’d been bitten. Decades ago. It was on one of Rumple’s errands. My magic would have kept it at bay until I had been killed and then the vampirism would have overtaken me as host. Expending that much power and then taking in that much murderous magic…I suppose you could say that I magically flatlined. It was all it needed.”

“So you…turned. Then and there? In daylight?”

“Luckily for me it was the afternoon.” She drawled. “Truth be told, it took me an embarrassingly long time to realise what was happening. In fact, it wasn’t until I had apparently murdered Archie that I realised what was going on.”

“You killed the cricket?” Graham’s brows rose.

“No. My mother did.”

“Your…? She’s dead. I saw the body. Christ, did you bring her back too?!” Graham tensed.

“ _No._ ” Regina pushed him back down to lean against the sink again. “I was betrayed by the pirate. It turns out that she’d made him a better offer. She was playing possum and set up a bubble that the curse couldn’t affect in the Enchanted Forest. She and Hook have been frozen there for the last twenty eight years. They found a way over, following Snow and Emma, they’re here in Storybrooke now.”

Her voice was steadfastly neutral but he knew her too well. She had to be terrified. She had feared nothing. Nothing until Henry had come along and she had cared enough about losing him but…Cora…Cora was a force unto herself and made Regina look like a kitten compared to a tiger.

The worst thing was; Graham fully believed that Regina had by far been the more powerful of the two sorceresses. She could have knocked her mother flat with a single spell had she desired it enough but Cora’s hold over her was too strong.

Graham sighed.

Things just became a LOT more complicated.

“She murdered Archie.” He realised. “And framed you to…why?”

“To get me alone.” Her voice was tight and Graham felt a loosening about his eyes. He felt like he might be able to open them now but did as he was told and remained where he was.

He needed more information.

“Is that why you brought me back?” His voice was very quiet. “You could have found someone else. Someone more controllable. Did you bring me back because…?”

“To kill my mother?” Regina chuckled and it was a bitter sound. “No. I really did bring you back just to eat you. My mother is my own affair.”

Graham grunted at that. She was lying again. Sort of. She was telling the truth when she said she wanted to deal with her mother on her own terms but…something was off. There was another reason she had brought _him_ back.

He needed to know why, but he wouldn’t question her just yet.

“I think it’s worked.”

“Okay, head back, let me clean you up.” Regina tilted his chin up and he heard the faucet twist on.

 Water splattered into the sink, little spots of cold against the back of his neck and head but he didn’t mind. She was surprisingly gentle as she rinsed the potion away. She made sure to dab every single part of it away and rinsed his eyes twice before she was satisfied.

“That should do it.” She helped him straighten up, mopping the last of the water from his face. “Try opening them now.”

Graham scrunched his eyes tighter shut and then opened them wide. He winced and hissed like a cat when confronted with the bright lights of the kitchen. He lifted his hand to shield his eyes and blinked rapidly. His eyes _burned_ but he kept blinking. Nothing else for it.

He was going to be so pissed if he’d come back as a blind vampire. Hardly fitting for a child of the night to need a seeing eye dog.

“How you doing?” Regina bent at the waist and cocked her head so that she came into his line of vision.

“Oh.”

He went completely stock still at the sight of her.

She looked…she looked… _delicious_.

Graham blinked some more when that word scrolled across his brain but he couldn’t think of a lesser term for it. His heightened senses seemed to condense and focus on her. He could see patterns in her skin. He could _feel_ her pulse in her throat and the vibration of the beat of her heart. She looked so –incredibly- alive.

“How many fingers?” Regina held her hand up in front of him.

“Four.”

“Follow.” Regina folded her fingers down to one and bobbed it about his field of vision.

“I’m fine.” He lost interest in that quickly. He’d much rather look at the rest of her. Gods, she even smelled good. That had been her? “Your hair’s longer.”

“Yes. It started growing again when the Curse broke.” Regina straightened up and watched him for a few moments as if waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Nope. Still not trying to kill her.

Weird.

“Are you…alright?” She prodded a little when he seemed content to just gawp at her. It wasn’t aggressive but it was a little unnerving.

“You have patterns in your eyes and hair. Like…constellations and tiger stripes.”

It was true. Her already dark eyes were dominated by silvery pupils that seemed to fracture and splinter out into her iris. It was like she had a whole universe in her head. Subtle banding marked the ends of her hair. Tabby markings.

 “Ah. Yes. We can see a little of the infrared spectrum now. Helps with tracking down…dinner. I think they’re sort of like bird plumage.”

“To attract a mate?”

Regina shrugged. She’d yet to find a better explanation.

Graham’s tongue traced over his teeth, measuring the length of his fangs and he stood up suddenly. He snagged his tee shirt and pulled it on with a flex that did not go unnoticed by Regina.

“I’m going now.”

She blinked at him.

“I’ll come back later, so you can…eat, but I see no need to stay with you.” He braced himself for her reaction and he was almost disappointed when she shrugged a shoulder.

“Okay.”

“Oh…kay?” Graham warily clarified.

Regina nodded.

“You’re not going to…protest?”

“I can’t stop you.” She blinked at him languidly again and Graham shifted from one foot to the other. She continued blithely. “Coat and shoes are in the hallway closet.”

“Right.” Graham frowned at her.

He was missing something. He had to be. She was taking this too easily. Not smugly, like she had already won, nor did she appear to know something he didn’t she just seemed…to accept it? That was bizarre. She’d never accepted _anything_ without a fight in the entire time he’d known her. She wasn’t built that way.

“Okay then.” Graham nodded and started for the doorway to the hall.

“Oh, stay out of my vault. My mother is staying there. Hook is at the docks and you two have _never_ played well together.” Regina padded after him and hitched her shoulder against the archway that served as a door to the kitchen. “The giant has apparently been neutralised but who knows what else my mother is plotting?”

“Giant?” Graham stilled in the act of pulling on a battered old pair of his boots. Had she brought all of his belongings here?

“Hmm. Another one of my escapades. Apparently.” Her voice was a little wry there. “I imagine my stripes will mark me apart from my mother but she does like to wear my face of occasion. Watch out for that.”

“Can’t she mimic the stripes and the eyes?” Graham was trying his best to take this all in his stride but he was unnerved by the calm way she seemed to be taking it all.

It was like…it was dangerously like she had _given up_.

“She doesn’t know about them.”

Graham froze in the act of pulling his coat on over his shoulders. Well, it had never belonged to him before the curse, he’d never had a black leather duster with a red interior but it certainly couldn’t have belonged to Regina or Henry so he supposed it must be for him. His eyes darted to Regina.

“She doesn’t…know?”

Regina shook her head in a silent negative.

Graham blinked, rubbed at his eyes and then tried again.

“Your own _mother_ hasn’t noticed that you’re a _vampire_?”

“It’s actually shockingly easy to hide when you know how.” Regina shrugged. “She thinks I’m at the office in the morning or busy doing my own things. It’s not like I’m Nosferatu, after all. Only another vampire sees the stripes and the glimmer in my eyes. To humans…perfectly camouflaged.”

“But…” Graham frowned, not knowing what to do with that.

How could it NOT be obvious? Regina didn’t even move in a strictly human manner anymore. She prowled rather than walked. There was a casual strength to her that was evident in the little mannerisms but it was OBVIOUS to anyone that knew her.

How could Cora not know?

Graham watched Regina and he would have missed it had his eyes still been sealed but he saw it then. The undersheen of pain in her purple rimmed eyes.

Cora hadn’t seen because she didn’t care to look.

She didn’t care and Regina knew it.

Whatever Cora had come to Storybrooke for, it wasn’t to rekindle her relationship with Regina. She likely hadn’t shared her real reason with Regina and Regina knew that too. She was a tool to Cora, a way to get what she wanted. As it had ever been.

Except Regina could _see it_ now.

Graham’s jaw clenched and she looked away from him as if realising that he could see too far into her. She cleared her throat and searched for something to say. She reached up to the little row of hooks in the hallway that held sets of keys and held a set out to him.

Graham gently took the keys from her and grunted in surprise when he saw that they belonged to his own house. A squat little bungalow on the edge of town bordering the forest. Deliberately out of the way.

He sucked in a breath and sought escape.

“You still got the same cell number?”

She nodded.

“I’ll…call you when I have a phone. We can arrange lunch.” He smirked at her and she mimicked the expression even though it never reached her eyes.

“Okay.”

Graham nodded and, with no further excuses, left.

Regina watched him go and moved to the front door to lock it. She tilted forward until her forehead rested against the painted wood of the door.

This was NOT going according to plan.

 

**_The Loft…_ **

 

Emma munched on her late night snack of toast and jam and opened the door when a knock heralded a visitor. She frowned a little, unlatching the bolt when the insistent knocking continued and swung the door wide. Who wanted to see her at ten at night anyway?

Emma went still when she opened the door and saw her visitor.

“Uh…hey.” Graham lifted his hand in a little wave.

Emma remained frozen, staring at him.

“I, uh, thought we should talk.”

The toast dropped from Emma’s fingers and splattered jam side down on the floor.

Graham looked down at the toast and then back to Emma.

“You okay?”

Emma made a high pitched sound in the back of her throat.

“I didn’t quite catch that.” Graham smiled without showing his teeth. Fangs were probably too much right now.

Emma kind of mumbled and flailed a little with her free hand.

“You should probably inhale.”

Emma sucked in a deep breath.

“Now let it out.”

Emma released the breath on a low whoosh and finally found her voice.

“ _What the hell?!”_ Her voice was barely above a whisper but Graham could kind of understand that. It was a lot to take in.

“I’m back. From the dead. It’s really me.”

“How the hell would I know that?”

Graham blinked and looked up at the ceiling, trying to think of something that would prove that he was who he said he was.

“The night I died, at the vault, you punched Regina in the jaw.” It was fairly unlikely that she had told anyone that.

“Snow knows about that.” Emma’s fingers tightened on the doorframe. “And if Snow knows then other people know.”

Graham snorted a laugh. Funny how her own daughter knew her mother’s weakness. It had been what had led them to all this in the first place after all.

That and Regina’s psychosis but whatever.

“I…don’t know how to prove it’s me.” He shrugged his shoulders. “You broke my curse, I remembered everything, I told you as much and then I died.”

“And that’s…the last thing you remember?”

“Oh.” Graham stiffened a little. “I didn’t…I’m not back _for you._ This is not a True Love thing.”

“Oh, thank god.” Emma sagged a little in relief and finally seemed to relax. She held open the door and Graham stepped forward to enter the apartment.

With limited success.

Emma swore as a bright flash of light slammed into Graham and sent him sprawling. He went flying across the hall and smashed into the wall with enough force to shatter human bones. He crumpled to the floor, sprawling on his ass, and blinked, stunned.

“Fuck me.” Graham wheezed, a little punch drunk.

“Are you okay?!” Emma squeaked and crossed the hallway to crouch in front of him. She lifted her hands and hesitated. “Anything broken?”

“No.” Graham coughed and cleared his throat. He was already recovering. “No, I’m okay.”

“What was that?!”

“Emma?!” Snow’s voice issued from deep within the apartment and Emma covered her wince. This was going to be hell to explain.

“Come on.” Emma looped Graham’s arm over her shoulders and stood.

Or tried to.

“It’s okay.” Graham unwound his arm when it became clear that he was heavier than he looked. Increased density. Explained why he hadn’t shattered on impact with the wall because that had been like getting hit by a truck. “I think you have to invite me in.”

“Huh?” Emma backed up a step when Graham stood.

“I think you have to invite me in.” Graham waved at the door. “I can’t come in without being invited. Not unharmed.”

He knew that because…because _Regina_ knew that. Her blood had told him. The knowledge unfolded in his head and Graham blinked but decided to roll with it. It was going to be a long freaking night if he flipped out at every little thing.

“What, you a vampire or something?” Emma snorted and then abruptly sobered. “Oh fuck _off!”_ She all but wailed.

“I didn’t ask for this.” Graham defended himself.

“Fine.” Emma held up her hands and let loose a slow breath. She deliberately retreated over the threshold to the apartment and ignored Snow as she found the doorway and gaped at Graham. “Before I do any inviting, why are you here?”

“Because you’re all in a lot of trouble and I have some information that can help you.” Graham dusted himself off with claps of his hands and heaved a sigh. This was not going well. Snow was openly gaping. He glared at her. “Stop that.”

“You’re dead.” Snow whispered.

“We’ve covered this.” He waved between himself and Emma.

“You’re _dead_.” Snow’s voice was harder. “I went to your funeral.”

“Me too.” Graham shrugged. “Do you want this information or not?”

“Tell us then.” Emma shrugged and Graham smirked. Not as idiotic as she had once appeared then.

He had liked Emma but…she hadn’t exactly been the most competent of people. She’d been punching above her weight and if not for extreme magical interference on Rumple’s behalf and also manifest destiny, she’d have never survived five _seconds_ against Regina.

It was good to see that she was learning.

“Cora’s here. In Storybrooke.”

Emma frowned but Snow’s eyes went wide. She spun around, calling out to her husband.

“Is that who brought you back?” Emma folded her arms over her chest. “I thought Regina had crushed your heart. That’s what Henry said she must have done.”

Graham twisted his mouth. Regina would be crushed that Henry knew that about her. Graham huffed out a breath when he remembered he wasn’t supposed to care.

“No. I’m not just animated. I’m actually back. I’m not a revenant, I’m me.” Graham thumped a hand against his chest and added as an afterthought. “And my heart grew back.”

Emma’s brows rose though she didn’t turn when Charming (complete with sword) appeared with his wife in the doorway.

They weren’t going to invite him in.

Fine, he could do this in the hallway.

“Listen,” he stepped forward, ignoring how Snow and Charming retreated, unsuccessfully attempting to drag Emma with them, “Cora’s here, she came with Hook. They’re in Storybrooke. Cora is staying at Regina’s vault, Hook’s at the docks. I assume his ship is hidden if none of ye’s have noticed the great sodding galleon parked on the wharf.”

“Why are you telling us this?”

“Because everything you’ve faced up until now has –one way or another- been because of Cora. The woman is _evil_. If she’s here then it’s not good for anybody.” Graham tried to stifle a growl and wasn’t entirely successful. “Whatever’s coming is going to be BAD.”

“How do you know?”

“Does it matter?”

“Well I’m thinking the only person that could have told you all this is Cora or Regina and neither of them are either sane or people that I want to listen to.” Emma scowled. “For all we know, Cora’s ripped out your regrown heart and sent you here to tell us this OR Regina’s done it to try and get to Henry again!”

Graham frowned.

“Why…why would Cora tell you she was here?” He was baffled. Were they really this dumb? “If it didn’t matter to her plan, she’d have made no secret about being here.”

“Regina could tell you to feed us misinformation about Cora to send us on a wild goose chase.”

“Well, that’s fucking dumb.” Graham shrugged his shoulders. “Regina doesn’t joke about her mother. _Nobody_ who’s met the beast does and Cora’s the type of goose that chases back.”

“Listen, her whole redemption thing has been fake so…” Emma shrugged and waved her hand as if that made all other points invalid.

Of course she did.

Graham bared his teeth for an instant, forcing his eyes away to attempt to curtail his frustration. If this was what Regina had been left with for resources, no wonder she had brought him back.

His brain stalled a little on the talk of redemption. Regina had changed in the 28 years she had been under the Curse with the rest of them. She had certainly become different around Henry before the boy had turned on her. Was she really trying to change for him?

Graham shook it off.

“She didn’t murder Archie.” Graham told them, knowing already that it was useless. He could see it in their faces. “Cora likes to wear Regina’s face. Chances are, the shit you’ve seen Regina do in the last few weeks has had VERY little to do with her.”

Emma was mulish but Snow frowned. She turned to her husband.

“We have seen her take different shapes before. To manipulate us.”

“Kind of her thing.” Graham growled. This was horrifying. Why were they all so SLOW about this? They should be working together and mobilising, not fucking about with motivations.

“Mom didn’t kill Archie?”

Emma, Snow and Charming twisted to see Henry standing in the kitchen area of the loft. He was wearing his pyjamas, Pongo standing at his side and he rubbed at his eyes but he was wide awake.

“Henry, you should…” Emma started but was summarily ignored.

“No. I don’t think so.” Henry padded to the door, shouldering his way between the adults and stalling when he saw Graham. “Huh.”

“Hello, Henry.” Graham nodded but really wasn’t in the mood for another round of ‘You’re dead’s.

Henry blinked but seemed to take it the best out of all of them.

“Mom didn’t kill Archie?” He repeated.

“No.” Graham shook his head. “She made a promise to you.”

“Don’t try and manipulate him.” Emma’s hand landed on Henry’s shoulders.

“Pots and kettles.” Graham snapped, baring his teeth.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Snow snapped.

“Ye know exactly what it means.” Graham rolled his eyes. This was bothersome. They were infuriating. Still, Henry seemed receptive and…and Graham had to try. He focussed on Henry again and ignored the adults. “She didn’t kill Archie. Cora did it to get your mum on her own. It’s what she does. She gets your mum on her own and then she hurts her. She hurts her and makes her think that nobody is going to help her and that she’s awful and she’s not worth saving…”

“You can’t tell him that!” Emma tightened her grip on Henry’s shoulders and Graham snarled at her.

“What? The truth?” He glared at each of the adults in turn. “The truth that ye all must have figured out but haven’t bothered to try and explain to the boy? Psychopaths don’t just _happen_. They’re not born into lives of horror and violence. Regina was made into this and the monster that did it is HERE and trying to do it again.”

“Why are you defending Regina?” Emma threw up her hands.

“Probably because she’s the only one that can actually stop Cora.”

“I can do it.”

Graham laughed at Emma. A proper laugh. He hadn’t laughed in such a long time but it really was laughable.

“She’ll eat you alive.”

“No she won’t. She can’t rip out my heart.” Emma was mulish.

“You really think the same trick is going to work twice on her?” Graham narrowed his eyes at her. “Really?”

“He’s right.” Snow said suddenly and Emma looked at her sharply. “Cora is a whole other level and she has a hold over Regina that’s…frightening.”

“A hold that’s slipping.” Graham said suddenly. He hadn’t realised it was true until that moment.

“What do you mean?” Snow frowned.

“Regina knows this isn’t about her. Cora’s come back for something and it’s got very little to do with maternal love. Regina knows Cora is using her.”

“So?” Emma hunched her shoulders and Graham had never more wanted to punch a person.

“So, ye twit, there’s a chance.”

“For an alliance?” Charming caught on. Already shaking his head.

Graham let loose a frustrated breath. This was _maddening_. They knew. They KNEW! They knew what Cora was, what she was like, what she was capable of and STILL they refused to help. Why? Why the fuck were they like this?

He’d been imprisoned by Regina for DECADES and he still recognised that she was the best hope they had of driving Cora off. Of defeating her.

“You think mom would do that?” Henry asked, ignoring the adults over his head. “You think she’d fight her own mom if it meant being on our side?”

“No.” Graham shook his head. He continued when Henry looked crestfallen. “I think she’d do it if you asked her to.”

Henry blinked.

Graham looked up at the rest of them.

“Think about it. Two things drive Regina; survival and her son. You’ve got one, I’ve got the other. We can point her at Cora.”

“Why do you have Regina’s survival?” Emma frowned.

“Doesn’t matter how.” Graham dismissed it. “Think about it.”

He was so done with this. He had to leave before he got blasted across the hallway from trying to throttle one of them. He turned to go. Suddenly feeling very tired.

“Have you seen her?” Henry twisted out of Emma’s hold, dashing across the hallway and gripping Graham’s hand.

Emma made a sound of protest, jumping after Henry but stalled when Graham levelled a look at her.

Oh…she suddenly really didn’t want to mess with a man with a face like that.

Graham turned back to Henry.

“Yeah. Saw her tonight.”

“How…how is she?”

Graham mulled it over. Trying to condense all the emotions he had seen in Regina down into one or two words. One seemed prevalent.

“Sad.” He looked down at Henry again. “She misses you.”

Henry’s mouth twisted and Graham sighed.

“Ye don’t have to believe me. You’ve always been stubborn but it’s worth checking out. If she didn’t kill Archie, there’s a chance that Cora hasn’t either. Maybe the cricket’s worth something to her. There’s Regina’s vault or the ship at the docks. He’d be there if he’s anywhere.”

“The invisible ship that none of us can see?” Emma snarked.

“Aye, well ye couldn’t see the Curse and look how well not believing in that turned out.” Graham nodded meaningfully at Henry. “Regina might tolerate your lack of faith harming Henry –for whatever bizarre fucking reason- but I won’t.”

“Is that a threat?” Charming leaned out of the doorway sword first.

Graham smiled coldly, swinging Henry’s hand in his in a casual reminder. Had he been of a mind to, he could have crushed the boy in an instant before any of them could react. They really needed to up their game and drop their idiocy if they planned on surviving Cora.

“Ye know I don’t make threats. I just do.” Graham bared his over sharp teeth. “Besides, I owe Henry.”

“We just want what’s best for him.” Emma tried to edge closer and peel Henry away from Graham but Henry wasn’t at all afraid of the Sheriff. He had grown up with the man. A lot more than anyone here realised.

Graham had been far more present in Henry’s early life than he had been towards the end. He’d been around at the manor often, Regina didn’t know that Henry remembered but he did. He remembered Graham being there. He remember mistaking him for his father. Because who else could he be?

Graham had come around less after that, at least less around Henry, but he had still been _there_.

Before the book had told Henry of Charming’s existence, Graham had been the man that Henry had looked up to. He’d been big and strong and brave and Regina had liked him if not loved him like Snow did Charming…and here Graham was defending Regina.

Henry squeezed Graham’s hand and Graham looked down at him.

“Think about it, eh?” Graham gave a little squeeze back and a small half smile. The one he had always given Henry whenever he saw him. A little bit awkward and a little bit affectionate but nothing harmful.

“Will she see me?” Henry asked quietly.

Graham’s brows shot up and he blinked in surprise.

“Oh.” Henry’s heart sank, misreading the shock in Graham’s face.

“’Course she will.” Graham frowned and then shot a look at Emma and the rest of the Charming clan. “I’ve no idea why you’d think she wouldn’t.”

There was a steel undercurrent to his voice and the meaning was clear. He decided to hell with it. He’d deal with the consequences later.

“Tomorrow. Come to her house after lunchtime. I’ll make sure she’s there.”

Henry’s entire face lifted in something like happy, disbelieving surprise and Graham smiled tightly. What the hell had they been telling him?

Regina might have been a lot of things but a bad mother hadn’t been one of them. All she had ever done was try to keep Henry from a woman that had given up her rights to him a decade ago. A fact that everyone seemed to have conveniently forgotten.

“I don’t think…” Emma began but Graham didn’t care.  

“I’ll come pick you up if no one else will take you.” Graham told Henry firmly. “Don’t you worry, you can still see her whenever you want.”

Graham had no real concrete idea as to why he was acting this way. It felt dangerously like he was defending Regina, a woman who deserved nothing from him, but the fact remained that she knew Cora the best out of all of them. She also already had the bitch’s trust and they could use that for information.

Of course, that left the question as to why Graham was so intent on making sure that Cora was dead at the end of all this. It shouldn’t matter to him at all what the witch did but…he’d been dead and had no desire to repeat the process. He supposed Cora might come for him if she thought he was a bad influence on Regina and this could be called preemptive but…that didn’t quite fit.

Maybe he was doing it for Henry. The boy deserved to know that his mother really did love him. That _someone_ had stuck by him from the beginning.

Yeah. That was probably it. He owed Henry for breaking the Curse on him.

That would do.

“See you tomorrow.” Graham gave Henry another half smile and Henry reluctantly let go of his hand.

“Okay.”

“I’ll get a cell so you can call me.” Graham promised and then turned to leave. He wasn’t much for goodbyes.

“How do we know this isn’t a trap?” Emma darted around Henry to put herself between him and Graham. A bit late but the effort was made.

“I don’t care what you think it is. The information is yours. Act on it for once, hmm?” Graham tossed that over his shoulder and disappeared down the steps.

He was so fucking done with these people.

 

**_Later…_ **

 

Dawn was greying the sky before he ended up back at her house.

He’d gone back to his own home and –fortunately- had been able to let himself in without an invite.

It had been barren. Someone (Regina likely) had shut the house up. Packed his things and covered the furniture with dust sheets. It was still being cleaned occasionally, no one had let it fall into disrepair, but it was…dead. His coffin had been more welcoming.

He’d looked at his bed and changed the sheets. He’d puttered about the house and removed the dust covers from the furniture. He’d turned on the TV and switched it off again. The radio and then abandoned that too. He’d paced the hallways of the little house tried to find a place to sleep that might seem welcoming or comfortable.

He didn’t want his bed. It felt too exposed. He’d considered the closet too, even under the bed, but he couldn’t bring himself to settle.

He’d finally given up on that and prowled out into the night. Up into the forest and the witching hour that waited there. He’d made fast progress through the woods, looping around the town and soaking in the scent of pine and the night had been wiled restlessly away until he’d found himself…right back where he’d started.

Graham glared up at the manor and rocked his jaw to the side. He hovered uncertainly at the gate. The lights were still on. She was still up. Not surprising considering her newly mostly nocturnal lifestyle but…still.

The front door open, she was waiting on him.

Graham huffed a sigh and started up the garden path. He hesitated at the door.

“Invite me in?”

Regina frowned, cocking her head, and stepped back to open the door.

“Ye have to say it.” He waved at her as if to encourage her to speak.

“Come in.” She seemed a little baffled still but invited him in.

Graham cautiously slunk over the threshold, braced for being hurled backwards, but it turned out that being invited into a vampire’s home worked well enough even if the one inviting was a vampire herself.

“That’s not a myth?” Regina was dressed for bed.

She wore blue silk pyjamas. The cute ones rather than anything slinky that she might have worn for seduction. Her hair was ruffled as if she had been tunnelling her fingers through it on the regular. Her face was bare of makeup and she looked…nice.

Graham did his best to ignore it.

So she wasn’t acting in a way he could predict. Something had obviously changed for her. For the first time, she wasn’t positively dripping with power, but no. It was something deeper than that. Something less…he didn’t know what. He just knew she was different.

“Apparently not.” Graham shrugged out of his coat and let her take it from him. “I think I could have pushed through it had I been braced but…not easily and I wouldn’t be the same on the other side.”

“Makes sense.” Regina shrugged easily enough and hung up his coat in the closet. “Homes are sources of power, magically speaking. They mean protection. To a magical predator like you or I…those defences could pack a punch if not lowered.”

“That punch might have killed me had my bones not toughened up.” Graham grunted, toeing off his boots. He was surprised that she wasn’t gloating that he was back. “Did ye know?”

“About the invitation only setting?”

“About…me. Coming back.” Graham rolled his shoulders restlessly.

“Couldn’t sleep in a bed?” She tilted her head.

“No. It felt…”

“Exposed.” Regina nodded. “I didn’t know but…I don’t sleep upstairs anymore.”

Graham thought about that a moment with a small frown.

“Basement?”

Regina’s smirk was wry.

“Cellar. Basements are damp.”

“My mistake.” Graham matched her tone and waited. He wasn’t going to ask. She’d brought this on herself by bringing him back.

Regina smirked a little but it seemed more self-deprecating than anything else. She threaded her arms across her chest and picked her words carefully.

“Would you like to stay here?”

“In the cellar?”

“I’ve been renovating.”

“Lead the way.” Graham nodded.

He was getting tired. He could _feel_ the sun rising. It was nearly over the horizon. The fatigue was like nothing he had ever felt before. His limbs seemed sluggish and weighted. His head bleary.

Still, he managed to follow her through to the kitchen. The darkness of the house closed around them as she flipped one light off after the other. She opened the door with a brush of her hand over symbols that had been carved subtly into the wood and then painted over.

Graham felt a frisson against his senses at her contact with the symbols. Wards, he surmised. She was hardly likely to sleep unprotected, after all.

He followed her down into the cellar and stalled halfway down the stairs when he saw what she had been up to.

Renovating indeed.

There was no overhead light. Lamps of every shape and size covered many of the surfaces and she had certainly moved an abundance of furniture down here. It was like a miniature apartment.

A couch was crouched in one corner, banked on three sides by a small library of shelves groaning with books. Cushions were strewn over the floor in that corner. Rugs canvassed the floor in a mosaic pattern. More tapestries that must have come from her vault hung on the walls. A HUGE bed dominated one corner. It looked to have been made from wood she had scavenged though the piles of furs and pillows made it seem comfortable enough. A fridge was tucked away in shadow.

The thing that surprised him the most was the tarp spread on the other side of the cellar. A gaping tunnel could be seen around the hanging edge of more sheet plastic and there were several buckets piled neatly beside it.

“A tunnel to join up to my vault.” Regina followed his gaze and explained. “Construction was put on hold when my mother moved in.”

“What did you use to dig it?” Graham’s curiosity won out and he turned away from the tunnel to face her.

Regina lifted on hand, her fingers flexing and two inch claws that looked sharp and steely in the lamplight burst from each fingertip. It didn’t seem painful to her to do it, her fingers were curled a little but not in a rictus of agony. She relaxed her hand and the claws retracted.

Graham looked warily down at his own hands.

“They’ll take a couple of days to come in.”

“And ye can dig through stone and mortar with them?”

“Shear through steel too.” Regina shrugged a shoulder.

“What _have_ you been up to?” He looked back at her, a grain of honest query in his voice.

“This and that.” Regina shrugged again. “Surviving. Mostly.”

“Always preferable to the alternative.” Graham hummed and decided he had to ask because she wasn’t going to volunteer the information. Dawn was coming and he was running out of time to ask. “Where do I sleep?”

“On the bed.” Regina padded to the huge bed and began to peel back the layer upon layer of quilts, furs and blankets she had amassed. She looked up and caught his arched eyebrow at the excessive bedclothes. “Vampires like to nest.”

He grunted and eyeballed the bed.

“You can relax. Even if I wanted to do something untoward, I couldn’t. When we sleep, we’re _out_. Nothing can rouse us. We don’t appear to breathe, we look dead. For all intents and purposes, we slip into a coma every morning.”

“How do you…?”

“I filmed myself.” Regina hunched her shoulders in a shrug. “I was curious.”

Graham just watched her.

“Sleep on the floor for all I care.” She shrugged and crawled into bed.

Graham debated with himself for a moment. He didn’t want to be literally in bed with her. He hadn’t wanted to even come back to stay here. He didn’t want her hold over him to grow again…but she was forcing him into nothing and that was odd. Usually, when she wanted something she just took it. That was what she did.

This…allowing him to make his own decisions was as alien as it was unnerving. He kept expecting her to lunge for his chest to try and pry his new heart out of there and use it against him…so why wasn’t she?

She had told him that she had promised Henry not to use magic. She had said little more than that but he had heard her voice when she’s spoken. There had been more to that moment than her brief words had let on.

She intended to keep that promise, he knew that much. It was why she had brought him back and hadn’t simply murdered another of the residents in Storybrooke and turned them.

Or…considering the conversation with the Charmings he’d had a few hours previous, maybe he was the only one she could tolerate.

A feeling he could identify with after such a frustrating encounter.

Graham started to undress. He peeled off his tee shirt and his jeans and socks. He crawled into the other side of the bed, staying away from her as much as possible.

She didn’t appear to notice or care. She was curled onto her side facing away from him and burrowed under _several_ layers of blankets.

Graham settled himself as comfortably as he was able.

She was right, the cellar felt more _secure_. Maybe it was the earth all around them or that he wasn’t alone whilst he slept but he didn’t feel like the walls were too far away anymore. He didn’t feel like the ceiling was as open as the sky.

He tensed only when she rolled over and reached out.

Graham’s hand snapped out of its own accord and manacled around her wrist.

She looked at him with surprise but no fear. She looked away from him to the wall.

Ah, a light switch. Right.

Graham released her and she flicked the lights off. The cellar was plunged into darkness, so very quiet down here beneath the house and Graham felt the rising sun push him deeper and deeper into stupefying languor.

“Regina?”

“Hmm?” She sounded as tired as he felt.

“I’ll wake up tomorrow?” He hadn’t wanted to voice the question.

He blamed the sun. He felt like it was stripping him away to nothing as it clambered over the horizon. Dawn was breaking and he felt like he was being wiped away alongside the dark of the night. Like he was being banished from his own body.

It felt far too much like dying all over again.

“Yes.” Her hand hesitantly came down on his shoulder. “You will.”

Graham reached up, he thought to push her hand away, but his fingers tangled with hers and the sun finally rose.

He went slack, his head lolling against the pillows of the bed and he finally relaxed for the first time since being awakened from the grave.

His hand remained on hers.

 

 ** _Noon_** …

 

Graham snapped awake all at once.

His heart thundered into a kicking beat, his lungs sucked in a deep breath and his eyes flashed open all at once. Life surged back into him, power returning with the passing of the sun over its zenith. He no longer felt like he was being crushed into nothing.

It hadn’t truly been _sleep_.

There had been no dreams, he hadn’t moved at all in the morning. His fingers were still tangled with Regina’s over his shoulder. There was no fuzzy awakening. He had been unconscious, entirely out, dead to the world, then he had NOT been. He didn’t feel stiff as he would have had he slept in the same position all night.

Hell, he felt like a fucking tiger.

Strength hummed throughout his body, blood rushing in his veins. He could smell everything. The earth through the cellar walls, the honey smell of summer aboveground, Regina, lying beside him.

He turned in time to see her wake. 

She jolted, a bit more sluggish than he, her chest lifted as her lungs expanded in a full breath for the first time in hours and her eyes snapped open. Her pupils glinted silver in the dim light from the one remaining lamp that had been left on up the stairs by the cellar door to the kitchen. Her dark irises were rimmed with royal purple, peppered with stars, they glimmered. She blinked, a little bleary and looked about herself.

He frowned.

Why?

He felt like he could run a marathon. He sat up, lowering her hand to the mattress and watched her. His thumb traced over her wrist, feeling her pulse there.

Sluggish.

His heart kicked in his chest like a bucking horse. Steady like a drum but _booming_. His breathing was easy, not bordering on a wheeze like hers was. His fangs and claws were retracted.

Hers were not.

She was starving.

Graham noted it all dispassionately and wondered what he should do about it. He wondered why she hadn’t just pounced on him and taken her fill as she always had done in the past but…Henry’s promise. She had promised no magic and she had promised to be better.

To not be like her own mother.

Graham was quietly astounded when he realised that she wasn’t going to just _take_ from him. Even if her health depended on it.

That was in fitting with what he knew of her. There was nothing else on this planet or any other that could short out her common sense and self-preservation like Henry could. One word from that boy and she was putty. Why else would she say that she would rip out part of herself to please him because she didn’t use magic, she _was_ magic.

Well, she was no use to him if she died.

“Regina?”

“Hmm?” Her eyes were closed, she was trying to regulate her breathing.

“Are…are ye hungry?”

She nodded slowly.

“Sure…I can make food. In a second.”

“No, Regina, I’m asking if ye’re _hungry_.”

Regina’s eyes fluttered open. She lolled her head to the side to look at him and narrowed her eyes. She inhaled deeply and he watched as her lips parted and her fangs extended.

“Always.”

Graham watched her, ticking off the changes in her, she was trying to freak him out. To scare him. That…was not the effect she was having on him. He had not expected her hunger, or the tangle of feelings, of drives that came with it, to be contagious.

Graham considered a moment and tapped his tongue against the tip of one fang. He didn’t know how he felt about it but the longer she looked at him with such desperate, naked, hunger in her eyes the better an idea it seemed.

Graham lifted his arm to his mouth and raked his fangs over his inner elbow. It was just a graze, barely even a cut but his fangs were sharp and sliced him neatly. Blood welled from the wound and Regina growled low in her throat.

“Go on.” He held his arm out to her and was _entirely_ unprepared for her ferocity.

She pounced, carrying him clean off the bed to tumble to the floor. She landed atop him, straddling his waist, one hand wrapped around his wrist, the other pinning his shoulder to the floor and her fangs flashed. She struck like a cobra, biting deep into his arm where he had already opened a wound and Graham _growled_ when she began to feed.

Jesus, was this what it had felt like for her yesterday?

Graham made a sound very much like a purr, his hips lifting up off the floor involuntarily and jostling her a little.

She didn’t seem to mind. She tilted over him, maintaining her balance and drank hungrily. Her claws flexed against his shoulder, kneading at the muscle there, prickling him with her steel talons that were fully extended.

Regina was voracious, starved. She didn’t seem to want to stop. He supposed that made sense considering she hadn’t ‘eaten’ in weeks but he also recognised that the euphoria that was suffusing his body meant that he soon wouldn’t be able to tell her to stop.

Though…he didn’t feel weak. He didn’t feel lightheaded. He didn’t feel like he needed her to stop.

In fact, when she finally lifted her head, lapping at the bite she’d inflicted on him, tracing her tongue over the wound then kissing it closed, he felt stronger than before.

How did _that_ work?

Regina sat up, braced against his chest and watched him with eyes that _glittered_. Her pupils were blown wide, her iris nothing but a rim of purple around the mirrors of her pupils. She looked down at him, her lips bruised a little from the pressure of draining him, her hair wild and her skin thrumming against his.

She finally released his wrist and lifted her hand. She extended one claw and sliced into the muscle where her neck met her shoulder.

Graham didn’t need an engraved invitation.

He flipped them both effortlessly, his hand fisted in the collar of her pyjamas and he shredded the shirt in two entirely accidentally. He ignored her faint sound of distaste at the loss of her favourite pyjama shirt and it melted into a groan when his mouth closed over her neck and he bit deep.

He hadn’t bitten her last night. He had pulled from the wound she had made but – _oh­_ \- the biting was MUCH better. His teeth sank deep into her and she arched up beneath him as if electrified. The back of his fangs were hollow, funnelling the blood into his mouth. It filled his mouth quickly, her quickening heart rate helping it along.

 Her hands clasped at his shoulders and she groaned when he began to feed. He swallowed her down in deep, hungry, pulls.

His hunger was sated quickly and he kissed the bite closed after only a few seconds.

She whimpered a little in distaste at the thought of him pulling away and he smirked.

Oh, he was far from done. There were many different kinds of hunger and they were all jumbled together in his head.

His lips skimmed over her collar bone, nipping at her there with his teeth, biting just a little at her jugular. A shiver went through her. She liked that. Her legs cinched about his waist. She liked that _a lot_.

His hips rocked into hers. His cock rock hard and digging into her soft heat through the layers of material that separated them.

She _keened_ at the contact and he chuckled.

She’d never been this responsive. Their time together had been scratching an itch. Mutually beneficial often times. As his Cursed self, he had despaired at the gaping chasm of emotion that had been between them but he really didn’t care about that right now. He cared about remembering every little thing that drove her wild because it might make her bite him again.

He peeled her out of her shirt and she definitely wasn’t complaining. She wore a soft bra beneath it, one she preferred to sleep in and not one to impress him. He tugged at it, helping her wriggle out of it and growled a happy sound when she was bared to him.

He wanted to kiss every inch of her. Not just because he desired her taste but because his mouth was a whole other erogenous zone. His _teeth_ felt like they had a hard on. His fangs ached to press into her skin. His jaw throbbed, his tongue burned for contact and he was all but drooling for her.

Her hand fisted in his hair and she dragged his mouth down over hers. Everything he felt, she had to feel tenfold. They both moaned desperately when their lips met. His tongue thrust into her mouth and he ground his cock against her when she sucked on his tongue.

Graham nearly howled when his tongue caught against her fangs. He nipped at her lips and lost himself to this new sensation. Every bite, no matter how small, pushed them higher. His tongue stroked hers and his hips rocked against hers.

He was _close_. Holy shit, he’d just _kissed her_ and he was ready to spill his load like some untried boy. His nails raked at the rugs above her head, her claws combed through his hair and her legs cinched tightly about his hips.

Then she quite deliberately sliced her tongue on one of his fangs.

Graham growled desperately, gripping her by the hips and lifting her up against him as he tumbled over the edge, helpless to stop it.

He groaned into her, shuddering against her, his teeth sinking into her lip and he grinned when she dragged all ten claws down over her back. She shivered beneath him, groaning into his mouth, writhing under him as she came.

They heaved for breath, recovering in the aftermath, their mouths flushed with the stain of blood.

But not done. Not nearly done.

It took Graham a second to realise that his cock was still at full attention. He _had_ orgasmed, he’d felt it all over his body, but apparently that didn’t matter to his new physiology. There was no embarrassing damp spot on his shorts, he hadn’t made a mess of himself he had just…who cared?

Graham stood, snatching Regina up off the floor and tossing her onto the bed. He shucked his shorts in a single move and tore at her pyjama pants, flinging them over his shoulder when he’d dragged them off her legs.

He growled, spreading her thighs and making room for himself between them.

She screamed when he ducked his head and bit into her inner thigh.

Her back arched up off the bed, her claws tunnelling into his hair, scraping his scalp and she panted raggedly as he sipped from her skin. He kissed the wound closed quickly and buried his mouth in her cunt next.

He did not bite. Of course not. His tongue speared into her with enough strength to cause her to almost levitate off the bed. She panted raggedly for him, her legs slinging over his shoulders to keep him close.

She was sopping for him. Dripping with arousal, the heady scent of her orgasm filling his head and hot on his tongue. He lost himself in her. His newly sensitive tongue and teeth enjoying the feel of her cunt easily as much as he would have loved burying his cock in her.

He pushed two fingers into her, stretching her carefully, it must have been a while for her. She begged for more. He added a third finger and sucked on her clit, grinning as she went tumbling headlong over the edge. Her tremendous strength holding him exactly where she wanted him until she collapsed back against the bed in a raggedly panting heap.

Graham crawled up her body, licking his lips like the cat that had got the cream and then some. His fangs flashed and her eyes hooded at the invitation. She arched, baring her throat to him and he shook his head, it was her turn.

He dragged her closer to him, hooking one of her knees over his elbow and leading her hand to his cock.

He growled in approval when she wrapped delicately strong fingers around his girth and stroked him expertly. She very much remembered what he liked and seemed more than willing to learn whatever else might please him with the changes in their biology.

Regina guided him into her and purred, arching beneath him when his thick cock pushed into her inch after inch. He took it slowly, not wanting to hurt her, letting her adjust but she took him without problem. She stretched deliciously around him. That extra strength evident in every muscle of her body as she clamped down around him like a vice.

Graham growled and leaned closer to her, bringing her mouth to his chest.

She bit him without further invitation. Blood spilled over her tongue like a drug she couldn’t ignore and her arm clamped around his neck to hold him close as she fed.

He pounded into her, fucking her furiously. The sensation of taking her hard and fast as she drank slow and languid from his body was a push and pull of sensation that he didn’t know what to do with.

His hand snaked between them and his thumb found her clit, twining delicate circles about the sensitive flesh there until she gasped against his chest. She hastily closed the wound and threw her head back.

Sated finally. For the first time in _weeks_ she felt satisfied in one aspect. Now her body was free to focus on other hungers.

Her hips rocked to meet his with every thrust. She shivered at his ministrations of his hands on her body, his cock invading her over and over. She nipped at his neck. Not to feed from him, just to let him know she could if she wanted to.

He thundered a snarl and she drew back, her lust receding for a moment. He shook his head wildly, gasping for breath, desperate and drew her mouth back to him.

Oh, he’d liked it.

Well. That was good.

She kissed and bit and licked. Grazing his skin until the chords on his neck stood out in sharp relief. His hand dug into her hip, the heel of his hand pressing hard against her clit and he shoved her harshly into her third orgasm.

She bit down, she couldn’t help it, and he _roared_.

His cock pounded into her and he clawed at her, dragging her closer, trying to get as close to her as physically as possible. He exploded into her, finally coming as he had as a man, her body drawing him in, draining him of everything.

Graham braced himself over her, weight caught on shivering arms, and panted hard. He could still taste her blood in his mouth.

Not metallic as blood had tasted when he was human but…he could taste _her_ in it. Her magic he supposed. It was heady and intoxicating. He felt like he’d never have enough but…he was content to wait until the next time.

He licked at his lips, tasting her arousal as well and smirked to himself.

He looked down at Regina and was surprised to find her watching him. She was breathing hard, glistening with sweat and looking more than a little pleased with herself but there was a layer of unease beneath that.

“I don’t think the feeding thing is going to be a problem.” Graham decided after a moment, pulling out of her and flopping down onto the mattress beside her. “That was…”

Graham didn’t know the words.

“Yes.” She panted still and stretched languorously. Vocabulary was the least of her worries.

She hadn’t realised how _weak_ she had felt until she’d had a proper meal. The difference was instantaneous and shocking in its pleasure. She didn’t ache anymore. No more stomach cramps. Her jaw didn’t feel like it was on an overactive spring. She felt warm and syrupy and more than a little mellow. Which may well have had something to do with the three orgasms he had just given her and the miniature explosions of pleasure over her skin every time he had bitten her but…whatever. She’d take it while it was going.

“Was that twice for you?” She turned to him suddenly.

“Yeah. I guess no turnaround time until I’m satisfied.” Graham nodded, his breathing finally slowing. He was surprised. She had never cared if he’d been pleased in the past.

“Huh.” She raised her eyebrows in surprise at that.

“Immortality isn’t all bad then.” Graham smirked and then sobered suddenly. “What time is it?”

“Coming up to one.” Regina twisted her neck to look at the little glow in the dark clock on what passed for a bedside table down in the cellar.

“You’d better shower. Henry will be here soon.”

Regina went very still.

“I invited him over.” Graham continued blithely and sat up. He looked down at her. “Either that or I’ll go and get him. The rest of the family didn’t seem too pleased about it.” He scrubbed his hands through his hair and ignored the way she was staring at him.

“You went to see…Miss Swan last night?”

“Aye.” Graham stretched with a pop and crackle of bones. Ignoring her glare. “She didn’t get half annoying whilst I was dead. Is that new?”

Regina blinked when he turned to look at her, a little thrown by the turn of the conversation.

“She does seem a little more insufferable lately.” She murmured finally.

“Spending too much time with her parents probably.” Graham scratched at the stubble on his chin. He pondered whether or not he should grow a beard.

“No doubt.”

“Get up. Shower. I can make breakfast.” Graham leaned over the bed and picked up his jeans from where he had dropped them on the floor the night before. He wriggled into them, carefully zipping up and turned to see her.

Oh, he’d trashed her shirt.

“Here.” He scooped up his abandoned tee shirt and held it out to her.

“Why?”

“So the neighbours don’t see your naked self through the windows when you eventually go upstairs?”

“No. Why did you invite Henry over?”

“You miss him.” Graham waved the shirt at her and she took it with what seemed like numb fingers.

“But…why do you _care_?”

Graham shrugged.

“Okay.” Regina yanked his tee shirt over her hear and combed her fingers through her hair. “Helpful.”

“Emma and Co annoyed me.” He finally allowed. “I was talking sense and they were being a collection of arses about it. Inviting Henry over put their backs up a bit and he seemed worried about you. I told him you hadn’t killed Archie.”

Regina went still at that and then it burst out of her because she couldn’t hold it in any longer.

“Why aren’t you trying to hurt me?!”

Graham stilled in the act of buckling his belt and stared down at the leather in his hands for a moment. He smiled a little.

“You’re different.” He looked up at her and lifted his shoulder in a negligent shrug. “I can’t kill you because we need one another and I think hurting you would put you back into old habits so…I suppose I want to see where you go like this.”

“Like what?”

“Different.” Graham hunched his shoulders. There was no other word for it. She was just _different_.

Regina fidgeted with the hem of his tee shirt. She frowned. She had no idea what to do with that information. It didn’t seem in any way helpful to her. Was different…good?

“Come on, shower.” Graham tugged at her ankle and Regina clambered from the bed slowly, she had much on her mind.

Still, she let Graham herd her up the stairs and she made her way up again to the shower. She had to get dressed.

She didn’t let herself believe that Henry was really coming. The Charmings would never allow such a thing but the fact that Graham had even attempted to arrange it…that was interesting.

 

**_Later…_ **

 

Graham opened the door after being summoned by the doorbell. He raised an eyebrow at Emma on the other side.

“You’re late.”

“She wasn’t going to let me come.” Henry sidled past Graham and slipped into the house. He looked out for his mom, he didn’t see any sign of her and Graham seemed to be perfectly at home. The house smelled of food.

“Unwise.” Graham grunted and turned away from the front door, leaving Emma to close it behind her if she was coming in.

He wasn’t at all interested in whether or not she was staying. The boy was here and that was the important thing. With Henry here, Regina was reminded of what she had to lose.

Graham padded back into the kitchen lest the eggs be burned and set to scrambling them a little more vigorously. Bacon sizzled under the grill and sausages beside that. There was no bread in the house and Graham had took that to mean that if Regina didn’t have it then they couldn’t eat it.

“You can cook?” Henry finally came into the kitchen after checking the living room for his mother. “Where’s mom?”

“Yes and showering.” Graham flipped a dish towel over his shoulder and bent to flip the bacon. “She’ll be down when she gets hungry enough.”

“Does she know I’m coming?”

“Probably why she’s fussing with her appearance so much.” Graham nodded and Henry smiled at that.

It was strange, to see Graham so at home in the manor. The former sheriff had bare feet and a bare chest, he wore only his jeans and a dish towel slung over his shoulder. He was making eggs and bacon as if he’d been doing it for years and it occurred to Henry only then that maybe he had done. In the years of the Curse before Henry had come along.

What had his mom and Graham been like before Henry?

“I can’t believe I’m letting this happen.” Emma hitched her shoulder against the door of the kitchen and glared at Graham. “Shouldn’t you be burning up in daytime?”

“Think more Stoker and less Buffy.” Graham bared his teeth at her and bit into a sliver of bacon to test it. Not too crispy. Good.

“So did Regina make you into this? Bring you back to be her pet assassin again?”

Graham smiled meanly at her but didn’t see why he had to dignify that with a response. He had no idea why she was so pissy. Probably because she was being reminded that she hadn’t always been the favourite parent.

“I had my reasons.”

Emma convulsively flinched clean out of the doorway when Regina ghosted up behind her and spoke in a level tone. She did not seem pleased that the Saviour had come attached with her son.

She looked over at Henry and just watched him for a moment. Her poker face was great but Graham could feel the nerves coming from her.

“Hi, mom.” Henry started a little nervously.

“Hello, Henry.” Regina padded deeper into the kitchen and glanced at Graham. She did a bit of a double take at his obdurate lack of shirt but he just smirked at her.

Henry bolted from his seat suddenly and tackled Regina about the waist. She staggered back a step, more to keep Henry from hurting himself on her toughened body, but caught him gently about the shoulders.

She smiled softly and bent to press a kiss to his hair.

“I’ve missed you.”

“Me too.” Henry mumbled into her black shirt. “You really didn’t kill Archie?”

Regina sighed.

“I really didn’t.”

“Will you help us find him?” Henry lifted his head to look up at his mother. “Please?”

Regina opened her mouth, unsure of what to say and then realised that she only really had one choice.

“I don’t know that he’s still alive.” She didn’t want to make a promise she couldn’t keep. The not using magic thing was only easy because she didn’t have it to use anymore.

“I think he is. Graham said he could be if Cora wanted something.” Henry ignored the way Regina stiffened at mention of her mother and shot a glare at Graham who succinctly ignored her and plated up breakfast. “I think she’d want to know what you’d told him in your sessions. If she wants to control you, that’d be a good place to start.”

Regina was still glaring at Graham and her jaw was clenched. She had to remain silent for several moments until her fangs receded and she could speak normally again.

“I suppose that makes sense.”

“So she’s probably hurting him.” Henry loosened his arms a little so it was easier to talk to her.

“I doubt Hopper cares that much about Doctor/Patient confidentiality in my case. He never has before.” Regina resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “He’ll have told my mother whatever she wants to hear.”

“So we should still get him back sooner rather than later.” Henry dropped his arms to his sides and watched his mom think it over.

She wasn’t like Emma who would agree with anything he asked for or hedge about it and chase after him when he did it anyway. She was different to that. Even before the Curse had broken. She looked down at him now and her head tilted to the side.

“Is this like meeting me at the diner?”

“What?” Henry frowned a little.

“Are you just doing this to get me where you want me? There are less cruel ways to go about that.”

“No!” The denial was flatteringly immediate. “I didn’t…you’re different to then. Less…mad.”

Regina looked down at Henry and shrugged her shoulders.

“I don’t feel different.”

“You are.” Henry insisted.

“I agree.” Graham set a plate down on the breakfast bar and waved her towards it.

“I don’t.” Emma took a seat on the other side of the bar without being invited.

Regina narrowed her eyes and growled low in her throat. She couldn’t help it.

Emma went very still, looking between Regina and Graham, growing tenser. It seemed she was beginning to realise what she had walked into. Vampire dens were dangerous places after all.

“How did you bring Graham back?” Emma looked at Henry, wondering how to get him away from Regina.

“Power of prayer.” Regina smiled tightly without showing her teeth.

“Really?”

“No, honey. Just some medicine.”

“Medicine?” Henry frowned. “Magical medicine?”

“Science certainly would have trouble understanding it.” Regina nodded.

“It’s private.” Graham cut off the conversation. He didn’t see why Henry had to know that his mother was a vampire too. If she hadn’t told him, she had her reasons. “Breakfast.”

“It’s lunchtime.” Henry frowned, not really protesting.

“I sleep later now.” Regina let Henry herd her towards the breakfast bar. She sat opposite Emma and ignored the other woman. Graham sat at one end and Henry took the other.

It was very nearly domestic.

“So you broke your promise to Henry.” Emma wanted to clarify.

The fork in Regina’s hand creaked as she nearly folded it in half. It was solid steel, she couldn’t use the silverware anymore. Regina let loose a slow breath and counted to ten, forcing her fangs to retract.

Swan would have no nutritional value but Regina still wanted to bite a chunk out of her anyway.

Still, there was nowhere she could go with that. There would be no wriggling out of it.

“Yes.”

Henry fidgeted where he sat for a moment and then turned to Emma.

“But it brought Graham back, breaking her promise. Does that not make it good?”

Graham very deliberately propped his chin on his fist as he crunched on a bit of bacon with a snap of his teeth. He smirked slowly at the Saviour and waited her out.

“That depends on what Graham has come back as.” Emma wasn’t about to play nice just because Henry was there. She owed these people nothing.

“Somebody’s bitter.” Graham murmured to his bacon and Regina spoke to Emma before the two could devolve entirely into an argument.

“Why are you here?”

Emma clipped her teeth together on whatever she had been about to say to Graham and gathered herself. It was evident she had wanted to work up to whatever it was she wanted to say but she forced it out anyway.

“I’ve come to…propose an alliance.”

Regina’s eyebrows shot up for her hairline and she narrowed her eyes.

“Why?”

“Is Cora really here?”

“Yes.” Regina gritted out and shot a look at Graham. He attempted to steal some of her untouched bacon and she slapped his hand away.

“Then it seems in everybody’s best interests to work together against her.”

Regina considered a moment. There was no way that Emma could have come up with that herself. She was far too short sighted. Regina sighed.

“You’ve been speaking to Rumple.”

Great. Of all the people she needed being dragged into her life –unlife, whatever- Rumple was always last on the list. The wretched creature would spot her for what she was in a second and know when and where she was likely to be vulnerable every. Single. Day.

“He’s indicated she’s someone we should be worried about. Hook as well.”

Regina rolled her eyes and slapped Graham’s hand away from her breakfast again.

“Well, if ye’re not going to eat it…” He admonished and she snatched up her fork to skewer a sliver of bacon hard enough to crack the plate. She huffed out a sigh.

“You want me to be your spy.” Regina ate her bacon. It was good. She managed not to bite off the tines of the fork at the same time (never fun though her new constitution apparently meant that she could now digest steel).

“Unless you know what she’s planning already?” Emma hunched her shoulders in a shrug.

“Not specifically. Other than controlling me.” Regina spoke blandly enough but Henry shifted uncomfortably in his seat. He did know when his mom was upset. He had caused it enough times after all. “It will be to do with power. It always is with her.”

“Who’s more powerful than her?” Emma looked alarmed.

“Me.” Regina shrugged a shoulder. “Rumple. Possibly you if she can access your magic.”

“Well…that narrows the field I guess.” Emma rightly looked perturbed.

“Rumple is the most likely target.” Regina cocked her head and ate some eggs, mulling it over. “Which means she’ll want to betray Hook at some point. She promised him his Crocodile’s hide. I can probably convince him to act first.”

“Convince him how?” Graham took a sudden interest and Regina eyed him with a sudden frown.

“Well, you’ll be nowhere in the vicinity for a start. I don’t have the time to reattach his remaining arm after you pull it off. Again.”

“One time.” Graham looked over at Henry. “One time and I’m never forgiven.”

“Well, I was _using him_ at the time.” Regina threw up a hand.

“I know. That’s why I pulled it off.” Graham pushed his empty plate away and licked his lips. Satisfied for now. He looked sideways at Regina. Satisfied with food at any rate.

“You pulled off Hook’s _arm_?!” Henry’s eyes were huge.

“He started it.” Graham shrugged and sipped some water.

“He was asleep in a bed.” Regina reminded him.

“I’m territorial.” Graham shrugged and winked at Henry.

Henry giggled despite himself.

“Anyway,” Emma edged back into the conversation before it was entirely derailed by this vampiric matinee performance, “how you going to convince him?”

“My winning personality.” Regina gave up and pushed her plate over to Graham. He grinned and dug into the food that was left.

“Uh…huh.” Emma nodded slowly.

“My mother will betray him. I will appeal to his baser nature and remind him that acting first is what has kept him alive for the last –oh- three centuries. All I’ll have to do is plant the idea and give him the opportunity, he’ll do the rest.”

“Really?” Emma looked sceptical. “That easy?”

“That’s all villainy is, Miss Swan. Motive, opportunity and survival instinct.”

“So then what’s to stop you from betraying us?” Emma hunched her shoulders in a shrug and Regina very nearly hissed at her.

“Emma!” Henry scowled.

“Absolutely nothing.” Regina was soothed a little by her son’s defence of her. “Save for my mother regaining control over me being a very bad thing for the people I love the most. I’ll fight to the death to prevent that.”

“Hardly a promise.” Emma pointed out.

“More than you deserve.” Regina growled.

The faerie magic had been _horrible_ to be near as a vampire. She had disliked it viscerally even if she had been able to snatch it out of the air like a physical thing.  

“Enough.” Graham spoke before Emma could, a low rumble of a growl in his voice. “Do we have an alliance or not?”

Regina turned her head to arch a brow at Emma. She certainly wasn’t going to be the one to put herself out there to be spurned again. She’d had more than enough of that in recent weeks.

“Sure.” Emma nodded, licking her lips nervously.

Something purred in Regina at the sign of fear. She could eat humans, they weren’t very appealing but she could, the sign of easy prey was a temptation to her darker nature. Still, she pushed that aside and turned to Henry instead.

“This may not go the way you want. I may have to do…bad things in order to win this fight.”

Henry did her the credit of considering her words for a few moments before carefully lining up his response.

“I think…I think maybe you’re the only one that _can_ do the bad things.” Henry fidgeted with his fingers and frowned, trying to put what he felt into words. “Like…soldiers do bad things sometimes to keep regular people safe. I think it matters that you don’t _want_ to do the bad things anymore.”

Regina blinked. Well, she could hardly say that was entirely true. She had different motivations for murdering just now, certainly, and Graham would lessen those urges if he kept her well fed but she hadn’t struck out the possibility of turning another. There was a pervasive instinct in her to do so…still, she would try and behave, for her son.

“This lasts until my mother is neutralised.” Regina turned back to Emma, as close to agreeing as she was likely to get.

“Wouldn’t want it any other way.” Emma smiled tightly.

Regina hummed deep in her throat and sipped her water. She looked over at Graham and saw him watching her. He looked pleased. She narrowed her eyes a little and he winked at her.

She heaved a sigh.

This was going to come back and bite her in the ass.

She just knew it.

Her eyes landed on Henry next and he smiled tentatively at her.

Still, she supposed there was hope and that was a lot more than she had called her own in a long, long, time.

**Author's Note:**

> Continue, yay? Nay?


End file.
